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Comment by bradfa | Hacker News Reader

Being an outsider to the EU (I'm in the US) it seems like there's a *LOT* more drama around vaccine manufacturing and distribution in Europe than in many other places.

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The EU's the only major manufacturer that allows (until very recently) unrestrained export, which is always going to cause more controversy. Most EU production is exported. AZ is particularly messy because it's dramatically underproducing relative to its own projections, and because there was a lot of messiness about the contracts.

We are talking about 27 countries with vastly different governments and cultures, of course there's bound to be drama when dealing with a pandemic as difficult as covid-19 for the first time. But I'll say it's been disappointing seeing how tribal some countries have become when push comes to shove.

Isn’t one of the main purposes and legitimizers of any government that it protects its citizens? I’m sort of shocked that the EU is allowing export outside the EU during the initial rollout.

It sort of looks from the outside that Brexit was done just in time as the UK government is now saving more UK lives than they would otherwise. If I were an EU member I would be extremely critical of the current regime and truly question how they are legit when the EU is far behind the rest of the developed world in this.

It’s not fair to EU citizens that pay into the pot of mostly unelected representation.

> I’m sort of shocked that the EU is allowing export outside the EU during the initial rollout.

What can we say? Once upon a time there was a belief that the world could come together and solve it problems if there just was some good will among the countries of the world.

This spirit still survives in the EU leadership that have spent so much time working for that on the European scale, so they simply have too much faith in international collaboration.

> I’m sort of shocked that the EU is allowing export outside the EU during the initial rollout.

So, if everyone had brought in export bans, then it's likely that wouldn't have been the end of it; trade restrictions on precursors and equipment and those little glass bottles (these were seriously a problem for vaccine manufacture at one point) would have followed, and world production would have ground to a halt. No country/bloc except possibly China can make a vaccine in large quantities single-handed.

The EU's mistake was in being the only big producer not to ban or heavily restrict export; being the last one to do it would be very dangerous and more likely to cause escalation. That's still a concern for current proposed EU export restrictions.

Of course, in the USA exporting vaccines to other countries is simply not allowed, and if they want to sell, they need to sell it to the US government. The same applies to UK.

The fact that EU is the only western entity that produces vaccines and where export is allowed makes it much more complicated.

Honestly it makes it look needlessly complicated and putting their own people last. If I were an EU citizen, I’d be hyper critical of the regime as it stands today. This is fair.

There's a lot of scepticism with regards to vaccines, which, in the current situation, the European Commission and national governments are keen not to encourage. There are also a couple of unfortunate incidents in recent memory which exacerbate the situation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandemrix

Err, the national governments and the European Commission are very much encouraging the skepticism especially in regards to AZ.

Saying it's not effective for older people, temporarily banning it, saying it's not for younger people etc. At this point a lot of average people are skeptical not because they are anti-vaxx but because of the mixed messages from the governments.

You really don't want to be on the wrong side of history for this.

Delay 2 weeks to double check some reaction numbers vs rush and possibly cause thousands of deaths?

I think it's good they were willing to put on brakes if not sure, and good they resumed when science told them it was fine.

'Science told them it was fine' before they pumped the breaks, too. You can excuse anything based on caution but both before and after the fact the expected value of the decision was that it will cost lives.

I think it's good they were willing to put on brakes if not sure, and good they resumed when science told them it was fine.

Except that's not the order that things went. They put on the brakes after 'science' told them it was fine to continue, and then resumed based on no new (public) scientific information.

Even if their intentions are good, the timing and communication around the whole things looks and feels chaotic and arbitrary and does not make people feel confident that they have any idea what they are doing.

> Saying it's not effective for older people

Nobody said that; they said that the trial showed no statistically useful evidence that it was effective for older people (which was true, at least for the original trial). Given limited supplies of AZ it arguably made more sense to use the more plentiful Pfizer vaccine for groups it was known to work on, and use the rarer AZ vaccine for groups it was known to work on.

This was informed by the limited supply; if AZ had been the main vaccine available decisions were different. As it is, restricting AZ to under 65s didn't meaningfully slow rollouts in countries that did it.

Temporary bans were decided by state members, not the EU.

After Brexit, the COVID crisis was seen by the EU commission as well as the new EU president as a way to prove the value of the EU.

As a consequence, the EU imposed that the commission would lead the vaccine acquisition negociation. The plan was simple: prevent countries from talking to the labs, get a good deal on the vaccines because you represent a huge market, and then use that victory to justify the EU existence/need after the Brexit blow.

Of course that plan did not materialize, the EU "great deal" that was announced by an overly confident Ursula von der Leyen was just smoke and mirrors, and now that the reality is hitting, the EU tries to do everything in it's power - as an aferthought - to do some damage control. And it's not pretty.

I think this has been a massive victory for Boris Johnson. Very much an “I told you so” moment the Conservative Party can relish.

I hope the EU gets it together and maybe other developed countries can help them after some time. It’s sad to see my friends there headed into another lockdown when everyone else is planning parties and trips for this summer and just getting back to life.

Sorry to say but tbh... the EU is viewed as a scrap yard where you dump politicians you can't afford to have around anymore in the national parliaments.

And these guys shall now solve a problem for real despite having a track record of being unable to do so?

There's a difference between the parliament, from which elected members come from European list and the executive body where commissioner places are really hard to get.

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